Toto, we are definitely not in Argentina anymore…..

Ok, so this is definitely a third world nation, BUT the Lonely Planet warnings seem a little exaggerated. Although we spent only 24 hours in Lima, we never felt unsafe. Might be because we stayed in the ‘nicer’ part of Lima, the San Isidiro neighborhood (compares to the sketchier parts of Oakland, CA).

Our first day in Lima, we hit Plaza Mayo, the main square in downtown Lima. The colonial-style government buildings were in great shape (especially compared to the graffiti-littered government buildings in BA, a city that is supposedly “so sophisticated”). Would-be-thugs were probably intimidated by the tanks marked “Asalto” and manned by a solider with his finger on the trigger of a machine gun. No seriously. Make the wrong move and you’ll get gunned down.

Next interesting observation – American chains have a big presence in Lima. You can eat at one of the many KFC or Pizza Hut locations, have your Starbucks, eat some McDonald’s and even get some jalapeno poppers at Chili’s or TGIFriday’s. Huge difference from BA where besides a few Burger King and Blockbuster stores, American crap chains were relatively nonexistent. Well, except for McDonald’s which is on every other block in every city in the world……

After a trip down the Fisherman Wharf-like strip of tourist shops, we stumbled upon a local market that was total chaos. Hundreds of vendors selling pots, pans, food, small children, etc. Kind of like the Crenshaw Swap Meet, except manned by midgets. Speaking of short people, Brianna and I feel like giants here – people stare, point fingers…. one kid yelled Godzilla and started running the opposite way. It’s pretty great.

We also stumbled onto Chinatown. We saw Chinese statues, Chinese restaurants, Chinese decorations. There was just one thing missing………….Chinese PEOPLE. What? It was like someone went through with a magic wand and turned all of the Chinese people into Peruvians. Interesting.

After an obligatory 4 hours of touristy stuff, we headed back to the ‘hood where we had a really authentic Peruvian dinner…..pizza. Considering we got only one hour of sleep the night before (hey, we HAD to go out to the clubs on our last night in BA right?), it was a pretty productive day. Next stop: Cusco